1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to a photoelectric conversion apparatus, particularly an apparatus comprising a photoelectric conversion sensor unit having a plurality of photoelectric conversion sensors, driving signal generating means for outputting a control signal for a photoelectric converting operation of the photoelectric conversion sensor unit and scanning means for outputting a control signal to output a photoelectrically converted signal from said photoelectric conversion sensor unit.
2. Related Background Art
Among the photoelectric conversion apparatus, there are such apparatus requiring a pixel resetting operation because an electric charge remains in each pixel.
FIG. 1 is an equivalent circuit diagram to indicate one sensor pixel of a photoelectric conversion apparatus and FIG. 2 is the schematic block diagram of the photoelectric conversion apparatus.
As shown in FIG. 1, one sensor pixel is composed of a bipolar photoelectric conversion sensor Tr, storage condenser Cr to store the signal from the photoelectric conversion sensor Tr, MOS transistors M1 and M2, which reset the base area and emitter area of photoelectric conversion sensor Tr, MOS transistor M3, which transmits the electric charge to storage condenser Cr and resets it, and MOS transistor M4 for output which outputs, the electric charge stored in the storage condenser Cr. The sign .phi.s represents the scanning signal of MOS transistor M4 for output, .phi.BR, .phi.VRS and .phi.T are signals for driving and resetting MOS transistors M1, M2 and M3.
In FIG. 2, said sensor pixels are arranged on the sensor pixel array 3 and signals .phi.BR, .phi.VRS and .phi.T for driving and resetting are generated by the reset signals .phi.A and .phi.B coming from a driving signal generating circuit 1. Scanning signal .phi.S is generated by the scanning circuit 2. Driving signal generating circuit 1 is engaged by the trigger signal .phi.TR and basic action clock signal .phi.CLK. Scanning circuit 2 is engaged by the basic action clock signal .phi.CLK and start signal .phi.ST. Signals coming from sensor pixel array 3 are output through output circuit 4.
However with the aforesaid photoelectric conversion apparatus, there have been such problems that, for example, when the frequency of basic operation clock signal .phi.CLK is raised in order to increase the signal output frequency, the signals .phi.BR, .phi.VRS and .phi.T for driving and resetting are uniformly shortened and the reset time becomes shorter than the preset reset time and it gives serious influence on the photoelectric characteristics of the system.